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Black men and women are not on the same page when it comes to who should govern the Sunshine State, and (I believe) we need some clarifying and healing conversations around this topic.
Though both groups gave Jolly his highest vote shares, Black voters had a wider gender divergence than other groups.
A nearly identical share of white voters supported David Jolly (40% of men and 41% of women). Among Hispanics, men and women diverged by about 6 percentage points (53%% of men and 59% of women were with Jolly).
Compared to that, the gender gap was more than three times as wide among Black voters — at 20%. That equates to 94% of Black women and 74% of Black men backing Jolly.
Not only that, but Black voters saw the gender gap widen compared to 2022, when white voters had the biggest gender divide. This cycle, the white gender gap nearly vanished while the Hispanic gender gap reversed and widened from 2 to 6 percentage points.
The Black gender gap doubled, from 10% in 2022 to 20% this year.
This impacted Jolly more than Byron Donalds. If NBC’s exit poll is correct, or at least indicative, Donalds won only about 8,150 more Black male votes than Gov. Ron DeSantis had in 2022 (only about 7.5% of Donalds’ margin of victory).
But for Jolly, the loss was a body blow. Jolly had about 69,000 fewer votes from Black men this year, compared to DeSantis in 2022. This drop off accounted for a whopping 64% of Donalds’ roughly 108,000 vote margin of victory.
This is not to blame Black men for Jolly’s loss. It’s pure math, and only estimated at that. If I were to blame anyone, it would be national party leaders and donors who could have made a difference in re-engaging Florida’s Black electorate.
Yet, the data speak volumes, and we should explore what it reveals. Constructively, of course. And when the time is right.
Watch this space for more election-related insights.
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